Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Bubbly Letters

Today at work I was given the task of updating the Emergency Contact information. Basically, I had to wander around the office, from desk to desk, and get everyone's address, home and cell phone numbers. At one point I was finished with everyone who was in the office. While I was waiting either further instruction or for more people to arrive, I did some filing and computer work. As I was in the middle of organizing the filing by building and apartment numbers, one of the frummy guys came into the office. I quickly jumped up, grabbed a pen, flipped the page of the Emergency Contact Information to where his name was, and I happily (try to have a good work attitude) asked him to please fill in his information. He asked me to write it out for him. I had absolutely no problem with the request, considering that he wasn't the only person to ask me, and because he was holding alot of paperwork. What amused me, and possibly even somewhat annoyed me (I can't exactly describe the emotion I felt), was when he said "your handwriting is probably more legible than mine, with the big bubbly letters."

No doubt my handwriting is more legible. I have cutesy handwriting (when I'm not rushing), that took me years to perfect. I went to a psycho public school where penmanship was practically a class in and of itself. However, his assumption that my handwriting is "bubbly" is false. His assumption is probably based on his observations of just about every frum girl in the universe...big bubbly letter handwriting. Its like a uniform code. If everyone dresses the same, it will prevent any form of personality development and individuality, same with handwriting.

Handwriting analysts have discovered that handwriting can tell alot about the type of person the writer is. By having a standard, stereotype handwriting amongst frummies, just shows how unbelievably "cookie-cutter" the society we're living in is. I think thats kinda sad.

6 comments:

הצעיר שלמה בן רפאל לבית שריקי ס"ט said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
הצעיר שלמה בן רפאל לבית שריקי ס"ט said...

...that's really funny by the way; girls who have 'bubbly' letters are more 'bubbly' personalities! : ]
get it? bubbly- bubbly..? ....anyone...?

flatbush gal said...

omg they do! how funny! i never thought of it as a frum thing. wow weird. i've even tried copying it before but now that i feel i have a better understanding of it i will try to appreciate my own narrow unformed letters.

frumskeptic said...

narrow unformed letter writers rule!!!
:)

Jessica said...

hm... never really noticed it before that frum girls have bubbly handwriting. i have chicken scratch for handwriting...

Anonymous said...

It's not just frum girls. The Italian Catholic school graduate (now receptionist) has the exact same bubbly handwriting as the frum girls her age.